Welcome to another session of Art Pastor Live! and our summer journey of Scripture and art.
Throughout July and August, I’ve been going live on Thursday afternoons at 4:00 p.m.—just a nice way to end my workday. We look at a passage of Scripture, following the Revised Common Lectionary. In this session, we’re looking at the Gospel lesson coming up for this Sunday from Matthew 15:21-28. It’s a notoriously difficult text: the story of Jesus traveling to the region of Tyre and Sidon, where he encounters a Canaanite woman who has a demon-possessed daughter.
I’m doing something in this session that I haven’t done online yet this summer. Instead of painting, my artistic challenge today is to illustrate this story as a graphic novel layout in real-time.
walking through the session…
Setting the Context: From Gennesaret to Gentile Territory
As I soak in the text throughout the week (I usually start meditating on the passage on Sunday morning), I like to look at the broader sweep of the Gospel narrative. In my Cartoonist’s Guide to Matthew, our story today actually only gets a single panel! So my goal today is to expand this story across multiple panels to capture its rich nuances.
To understand why this encounter is so intense, we have to catch up on what just happened:
Feeding & Walking on Water (Matthew 14): Right after the horrifying news of John the Baptist’s beheaded execution, Jesus feeds the 5,000 and walks on the water.
Healings at Gennesaret: They dock at Gennesaret, a Jewish region along the Sea of Galilee. The people have so much faith that they bring their sick just to touch the fringe of Jesus’ cloak, and they are healed.
Confrontation with Religious Leaders (Matthew 15:1–20): Scribes and Pharisees travel all the way north from Jerusalem to confront Jesus, accusing his disciples of being lawbreakers because they don’t wash their hands according to tradition. Jesus calls them hypocrites to their face, quoting Isaiah: “This people honors me with their lips, but their hearts are far from me.” He then tells the crowd that it’s not what goes into your mouth that makes you unclean, but what comes out of your heart.
After ruffling the feathers of the political and religious establishment, Jesus and his disciples decide it’s time to leave town. They travel away from Jewish land into the district of Tyre and Sidon—a coastal, Gentile region.
A Visual Reading of the Text
The first thing I do is read the text with a pencil. See this video that I made to talk about how to do it.
The Sequential Art Challenge: Laying Out the Panels
To tell a story visually through graphic novels, you have to think about visual flow, character perspective, and narrative pacing. I’m working today in Clip Studio Paint on my iPad (a tool I love because it syncs seamlessly across my iPad, home iMac, and my Mac Studio at Luther Seminary).
When you’re laying out a graphic novel page for English readers, you want their eye to start in the upper left and move down toward the lower right. Here is how I structured the two-page layout:
The Uncomfortable Encounter (Matthew 15:21–28)
Just then, a Canaanite woman from that region comes out shouting:
“Have mercy on me, Lord, Son of David! My daughter is tormented by a demon.”
Matthew’s use of the term “Canaanite” is somewhat anachronistic, but it intentionally signals to the reader that she is a complete outsider, an ancient ancestral enemy of Israel.
Notice how Jesus responds at first: he does not answer her at all. He ignores her. The disciples come and urge him, “Send her away, for she keeps shouting after us.”
Jesus breaks his silence with a rigid statement: “I was sent only to the lost sheep of the house of Israel.”
Undeterred, the woman comes closer, kneels humbly before him, and begs: “Lord, help me.”
Then comes one of the most troubling metaphors in the Gospels. Jesus says: “It is not fair to take the children’s food and throw it to the dogs.”
Without missing a beat, she counters: “Yes, Lord; yet even the dogs eat the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.”
At her reply, everything shifts. Jesus marvels at her: “Woman, great is your faith! Let it be done for you as you wish.” And her daughter is instantly healed.
Scholars have debated for 2,000 years what is actually happening in this story. Was Jesus testing his disciples? Was he using a teaching method? Or did Jesus himself experience an opening up of his scope of ministry through this woman’s persistent faith? Regardless of where you land on the theology, there is a clear visual narrative arc here: Jesus moves from a closed, narrow focus to a wide-open embrace of this Gentile woman.
Contemplative Practice & Studio Risks
Even though I’m doing a technical comic layout rather than a traditional painting, this remains a contemplative practice for me. It is a way of slowing down and paying attention. When you sit with a passage long enough to draw it panel by panel, you start asking questions that plain text reading misses:
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What did the woman’s face look like?
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Was her hair down and uncovered, signaling her working-class desperation?
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How awkward did the disciples look standing in the background?
Doing live artwork in front of an audience is always a bit of an experiment. I didn’t get as much drawn as I had hoped and I’m not sure how interesting it was to watch. Apologies.
In art, as in faith, we take risks. We put ourselves out there. Sometimes a live experiment works beautifully, and sometimes it’s just a rough sketch of a journey—but it’s all part of the learning process.
Final Thoughts: Paying Attention to Everyone
The takeaway I want to carry from this story and from our drawing today is simple yet profound: we need to pay attention to everybody.
We need to listen to everyone, especially those who don’t fit into our neat religious boxes, cultural expectations, or predefined ministry agendas. Everyone is carrying a burden; everyone is in need of healing and grace. Like this persistent Canaanite woman, may we have the courage to ask for mercy, and like Jesus at the end of this story, may our hearts always be willing to expand.
Join the Community!
Did you create art during today’s session? Whether you did a drawing, a painting, a sketch, or a Zentangle, I’d love to see it!
Head over to the Art Pastor’s Network, and upload your work. It’s not a place for critical art critiques—it’s a safe, encouraging space for sharing creativity in community so that together we can grow deeper in the love of God through Jesus Christ, in the power of the Holy Spirit, for the sake of the world.
Until next week, peace be with you!
This is my chance to invite you into my studio, talk about the fusion of art and theology, explore spirituality and scripture through visual art, nerd out about the Bible and Visual art, and just hang out with you.
